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Of course the counter point is that OS X passes the POSIX compliance tests, so this is apparently not considered to be a big deal. But instead of us debating h
by demallien 17y ago
Of course the counter point is that OS X passes the POSIX compliance tests, so this is apparently not considered to be a big deal.
But instead of us debating hypotheticals, perhaps you could list some of the "a lot of carefully coded applications" that break without this. Facts are always preferable to hyperbole.
- geocar 17y agoSome programs that depend (specifically) on this behavior I'm aware of: qmail, postfix, dovecot These programs derive their purported reliability from these rename() semantics. By the way, Windows passed the POSIX conformance tests, but only a salesman thinks this means that Windows is POSIX compliant.
- demallien 17y agoYou're sure about sqlite? it's just that Apple use that extensively as the backend of CoreData, so it surprises me. Or to put it another way, sqlite by definition doesn't depend on this behaviour, because it runs successfully on Mac OS X...
- geocar 17y agoI just double-checked, and sqlite doesn't in fact use this. Perhaps I was remembering sqlite2. I've edited my post. Btw, Apple uses dovecot and postfix on their Xserve platform, which means Apple does depend on this behavior. Since this is a race condition on Mac OS X (Where it is atomic on UNIX and POSIXish systems like Linux), people may think these programs work fine on Mac OS X, when in fact they can lose or destroy mail in some circumstances.
- j_baker 17y agoActually, I would believe that and I'm not a salesman: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows_Services_for_UNIX http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows_Services_for_... Microsoft actually has a UNIX emulation layer for Windows.
- geocar 17y agoWindows was listed as POSIX-compatible (passing the POSIX conformance test suite) as early as Windows NT 3.51, and perhaps earlier. I was not referring to add-ons that can make Windows more POSIXish, but Windows itself.